Papa Emeritus III and his new lineup of Nameless Ghouls in Ghost were heavier than when I saw them last year, and put on a great show.

I've seen Iron Maiden many times over the years, going back to 1982, and the band has not lost a step. They are among the all-time greats of Rock and Roll, and one of the best live metal bands to ever take the stage. I'd go again tomorrow if they were playing nearby. \m/

i had hoped to get to the Maiden show in Charlotte Friday night but couldn't make it work out. I looked at Ticketmaster yesterday and the only seats left were on the lawn at the venue. Maybe next tour hopefully.

I have tickets when they come to the San Francisco Bay Area. We have sixth row. Looking forward to the show. I saw Iron Maiden for the Piece of Mind tour in the early 80's. One of the best metal bands of all time. EXCELLENT live band. GO IRONS!!!

GHOST frontman and founder Tobias Forge, who performs as Papa Emeritus, says that the group was "never formed as a band" and was always essentially a one-man project, with many session musicians coming and going over its seven-year existence.

Earlier in the month, Forge was sued by four ex-members of the Swedish act who accused Forge of cheating them out of their rightful share of the profits from the band's album releases and world tours. That may have led to Forge's wholesale firing of the group at the end of 2016.

The lawsuit was filed just a month after guitarist Martin Persner  who was not one of the four former Nameless Ghouls behind the court action  announced that was a member of GHOST for seven years prior to exiting the band in July 2016.

In an interview conducted by Nicolas Gricourt of France's Radio Metal on March 28  less than a week before the existence of the lawsuit was first reported by the Swedish media  Forge was asked how he felt about Persner's decision to go public with his identity a little over six months after he left GHOST. Tobias responded: "It was pretty much what I had expected, so it wasn't like a big shock. There's not much to say more than that. It was perfectly in line with what I expected."

Confirming that he didn't speak with Persner prior to the guitarist's decison to "unmask" himself, Forge concurred that the move "does, obviously, take away the mystery from [Persner]." But, he added, "That's fine. That's perfectly okay."

Asked if the Nameless Ghouls are, or were, under a contractual obligation to not reveal their identities while they are in GHOST and after they leave the band, Forge said: "Well, I think that one of the mistakes was not putting a lot of pressure on them in doing that. So let's just say that, obviously, there was no such clause because I thought that was sort of part of the settlement agreement. But it wasn't. So there was no effective ban on hiding or there was no ban from revealing your identity."

Regarding his reasons for replacing the entire GHOST band at the end of 2016, Forge said: "I can't tell you the whole story, but without going into detail, the one thing that has always been a fact is that GHOST was never formed as a band, and its first lineup was formed after the first record was recorded, and it was just a live lineup. And from that lineup, it changed many times.

"If you've followed us from when we started playing live in October 2010, you will notice that there has been numerous changes over the years. And none of the people in the lineup that was in November last year had ever played on [GHOST's 2010 debut album] 'Opus Eponymous', for example.

I have tickets when they come to the San Francisco Bay Area. We have sixth row. Looking forward to the show. I saw Iron Maiden for the Piece of Mind tour in the early 80's. One of the best metal bands of all time. EXCELLENT live band. GO IRONS!!!

I always wondered if the Nameless Ghouls were anything more than a stage show for Papa's music. Except... it's the exact opposite of how it's been presented. I actually hate bands "As a brand" rather than a musical group. It never made sense to me to see a tour consisting of a fourth the players from the album and the logo.

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Quotes in context.*

Quote:

Originally Posted by Rommel

drive into the daughter's womb proper, fill the uterus with the dick snot